I am new to Linux, so go easy...

I installed RH9 about a week ago and recently rpm has been acting up. Starting about an hour ago, it won't work at all. By won't work I mean that as ROOT the terminal hangs even when I type

rpm -qa

I can do almost anything with rpm as any other user, but, as I understand it, most rpms need to be installed as root (is this a misconception of mine?)

In any case, I do think it is a problem that I cannot use rpm as root.

I have the following installed: (a rpm -qa | grep rpm by a normal user)
rpm-devel-4.2-0.69
rpm-4.2-0.69
rpm-build-4.2-0.69
rpm-python-4.2-0.69
redhat-rpm-config-8.0.21-1 (what is that?)

Any ideas? Thanks!

Try deleting the rpm database and then rebuilding it. As root:

rm -f /var/lib/rpm/__db*
rpm --rebuilddb

I removed the __db files, and then I rebuilt database and got the following error:

error: db4 error(16) from dbenv->remove: Device or resource busy

Any suggestions? Explanations?

Thanks!

I'm also running RH9 , also deleted and rebuilt the db, got the same error RPM's screwing up all over the place

This error can be ignored. You don't have to rebuild the database after deleting /var/lib/rpm/__db.*

Thanks everyone, everything is working fine now!